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Cato Weekly Podcast • September 30, 2025 

# How Government Shutdowns Actually Work 

Will congressional inaction lead to a government shut down? Do shutdowns halt the government in its tracks, and if not, who decides what stays and what goes? What does it mean for President Trump — or the rest of us?

Cato’s VP for Government Affairs, Chad Davis, in conversation with Patrick Eddington, senior fellow in homeland security and civil liberties at the Cato Institute.

*Correction: The 35-day shutdown in late 2018 into early 2019 was over Trump’s demand for $5.7 billion in federal funds for a border wall. The shutdown over Dreamers was three days in January 2018.*

[![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) 
This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/). 

##### Featuring 

[![Patrick G. Eddington](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/author_picture/public/2021-01/Patrick%20Eddington.jpg?itok=ddIWrIm5)](/people/patrick-g-eddington) 

##### [Patrick G. Eddington](/people/patrick-g-eddington)

Senior Fellow, Cato Institute

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](https://x.com/pgeddington) [ 

](mailto:peddington@cato.org) 

![Chad Davis](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/author_picture/public/2025-03/2025-02-25-Cato%20Institute-Chad%20Davis%20-%2011_1.jpg?itok=JYmu7hCg) 

##### Chad Davis 

Former Vice President for Public Affairs